Sunday, 26 May 2013

Within recent times, global productivity gains have been achieved by shifting production to Asian countries, particularly China. At its height, China's annual economic growth reached 14% in 2007 [1].

China's remarkable growth was driven by global demand for consumer products while global expansion was fueled by China's increased productivity. China has quickly come to recognize that this tightly linked synergy has a downside. It is simply not sustainable. Shifting real productivity from 1st world countries to emerging economies does nothing for consumer countries. US trade deficit has cost the US labor force 2.7 million jobs from 2001 to 2011 [2].

Central Banks in developed countries are trying desperately to keep their individual economies from sinking by pumping huge amounts of money into the system. The US Federal Reserve has committed US$2 trillion through Quantitative Easing. The Bank of Japan has pumped US$1.4 trillion while the Bank of England has added US$560 billion to the economy. [3]

Where is all of this money going? Why is the global economy still staggering?

All the euphoria is in the global financial markets. Stock market indices in the US have hit record highs while real productivity and wages are down. Governments continue to slash and burn social programs, healthcare and environmental protection. Unemployment reaches record levels and global poverty continues to rise. All the quantitative easing in the world goes to benefit the banks and their share holders and the rich who control the government. Unionized labor and the working middle class has been decimated and the gap between the rich and poor continues to widen.

Financial markets and high flying speculation are being buoyed by quantitative easing. That is where all the money is going.

How much longer can this continue?

Two things are looming on the horizon. The global economy will continue to stagnate while governments incorrectly attempt to revive the patient with austerity measures. How long will it take before the working class gets pushed to the limits and would no longer put up with the injustice?

Sunday, 7 April 2013

Every
textbook of economics begins with the definition of money as being the
following:

medium

measure

store

The
essential function of money is to facilitate exchange of goods and services.
This is the classic textbook first function of money.

The second
function of money is that it is a measure of value, which if examined closely,
is somewhat dubious.

Every
prudent worker/producer wishes to store away a portion of his/her earnings as savings
to be relied on at a future time. Money as a store of value is the third
function. Whether or not savings represent any real store of value will be
discussed later in this essay.

When
earnings are stored as savings this has the potential to reduce the money
supply. Currency becomes scarce and its value increases. The same amount of
currency has greater purchasing power and can be exchanged for a greater amount
of goods and services. This is deflation, the opposite of inflation. The simple
and obvious solution to this is for the government or banking institution to
inject more money into the system.

Since 1974,
the Government of Canada has abdicated its responsibility to the Canadian
public of putting money into existence. Instead, it has relinquished this
authority to private commercial institutions that now create money through the
issuance of loans under the fractional reserve banking system.

If the
Government of Canada were to restore its authority and responsibility, it could
direct the Bank of Canada to issue money at zero interest to
municipal/provincial/federal governments for public benefits such as education,
health care, social services and industrial infrastructure.

Instead, in
the current monetary system, all money is created as debt on the backs of the
consumer and taxpayer. Interest on loans becomes a debt to future
workers and society. Furthermore, the working class is taxed in order to pay interest on public loans which is essentially the working class being indentured to the corporate state.

Consider
the worker who attempts to save a portion of her income. If this money is
locked away in a savings account, it reduces the money supply and creates a
scarcity of money. The lending institution such as a commercial bank can put
this money back into circulation by lending it out to private and public borrowers. When the
worker retires she may require to make a partial withdrawal of her savings.
Since not all account holders need to withdraw all of their savings at the same
time, the bank can safely gamble on having only a fraction of the deposits
available in cash. This is called the fractional reserve requirement of the
banking system. In Canada
there is zero requirement. However, a prudent banker would be well advised to maintain a
minimum of 10% of outstanding loans available as cash on deposit. This is the
basic principle of the fractional reserve requirement.

Let us
examine this in simple terms. Imagine that initially the Bank of Canada prints
money and puts into circulation $1billion. Imagine that as this money is used
to trade goods and services, savers deposit 25% of this total, that is,
$250million into savings accounts in various banking institutions. With a 10%
reserve requirement, the banks all together can create loans totaling an
additional $2.5billion. This is money created out of thin air as credit to the
borrowers’ accounts.

Over time,
the principal amount on the loan is repaid and the balances on individual loan accounts are reduced to zero. The problem is the interest charged by the
banks on the loans. Where does the money come from to pay the interest? The
interest is repaid by more loans being issued. The essential point here is that
all money created in our present banking system is created as debt which will
never be repaid. Our present monetary system is a system of mirrors, a pyramid
scheme and a ponzi scheme. This ought to be considered criminal activity and ought be abolished.

The call
for public banking

I have presented an outline of how money is created in two different
systems. In the public banking system, the government of Canada
through the Bank of Canada can restore its authority to create money at zero
interest to be used to finance public service, infrastructure and social
well-being.

In the
current banking system, money is created as loans which is used to pay the interest
charges which accumulate in the pockets and accounts of the banks and its
shareholders. In this system, money is created out of nothing as a computerized data entry which has to keep on growing in perpetuity otherwise the system collapses. This has become a reality and only now are segments of the world population waking up to this fact.

Where is
the real wealth?

At the
beginning of this essay I hinted that money as a store of value is questionable. Any money stashed away as savings is supposed to represent wealth
or surplus. Money gives the holder an entitlement to goods and services. In
reality, money represents a burden on future workers and power to the holder
over indentured labourers.

Money
created as payment for interest flows back to the bankers and financial
elite, the holders of power in government, business and society. When governments,
businesses, individuals and the public in general assume a loan, interest
charges enriches the banks. We might as well just print money and hand it over
to the bankers.

Money
created by publicly own banks go directly to the workers and producers of
society to facilitate exchange of goods and services for the benefit of society
as a whole. There is no need for the transfer of money in the form of interest
charges to the banking elite.

If we
abolish the practice of lending at interest we would be taking control from the banking
establishment and giving it to the working class of society, the true producers
of real wealth.

Saturday, 9 March 2013

If you think the fiscal crisis or the US National Debt of 16 trillion dollars is something to worry about then you ain't seen nothing yet.

We have a much bigger crisis coming. No. A catastrophe of epic proportions. We will witness a complete meltdown of society as a result of global warming, financial collapse and social chaos, not to mention the geopolitical quest for world dominance.

Our present lifestyle is killing us all.

Governments, corporations, society and individuals are all to blame for this.

We are the enemy.

By 2050, we will experience extreme human pain and suffering like we've never witnessed before.

By 2100, world population will collapse to under 2 billion.

And yet no one is doing anything seriously about it. We are in denial mode. Severe short sighted thinking.

We worry about deficit, money, jobs and oil.

Wake up folks and kiss your children goodbye.

What can we do about this? There are steps we can all take to mitigate this, spread the burden and ease the pain.

Here are positive things we can all do:

Know whom you can depend on when the going gets tough.

Know where your food comes from and support your local farmer.

Watch where and how you spend your money and buy local.

Park your car and walk.

Create human scale communities.

Build resilience within your community.

Join or start a Transition Initiative.

"Limits to Growth" was published in 1970. We have had more that 40 years to reverse the trend towards self destruction. We did nothing and wasted 40 years.We have passed the point of no return. So what are you planning to do for the next 40 years?